Spoiler alert: this recap is for people watching Spiral on the BBC. Do not read on unless you have watched season seven, episodes five and six.
Chain reaction
This week reveals added layers of complexity on the money-laundering scheme. Soizic from the fraud squad explains how drug dealers needing to launder cash hook up with white-collar guys – like building contractor Pierre Solignac – to dodge tax or pay an illegal workforce. Supply meets demand. Gears within gears.
Team Gilou don’t care about any of that, of course. They police primarily on instinct, and hastily drawn crime infographics from fraud squad wonks simply won’t cut it. They want summary justice for Herville, and frustration with the investigation’s glacial pace leads them – as so often before – off–the–books and off–the–rails. In an unauthorised operation, JP and Tom run interference on Fouad so Laure can identify the client waiting for his cash delivery as Aline Lecomte MP. Further digging connects Lecomte to assets manager David Cann, currently represented by his old school buddy Edelman.
That intel comes at a heavy cost, though. Fouad is discovered shot through the head with the same gun that killed Wang and Herville. An exasperated Beckriche takes Laure and Gilou off the case before an apoplectic Roban trumps him, pulling both CID and the fraud squad and calling in homicide. Will this crew ever respect the chain of command?
Gilou
Emotionally, it’s a bumpy ride for Commander Escoffier this week. Things heat up with Laure, as they have a fake makeout session to avoid being spotted by Fouad. Going rogue, commandeering a moped and chasing down a bad guy only intensify the mood. Adrenaline, close physical proximity and a fraught shared history are a heady cocktail.
That all changes though when Gilou hears that Laure has given custody of Romy over to the Brémonts. It brings back being dumped in the hospital car park all too keenly. “I’m getting out,” he tells her, “I’ve had enough of you”. He may even mean it, but who will ever understand him better than Laure?
Laure
Quite apart from all the Gilou drama, Laure takes a battering this week. On medication for her depression and still reeling from losing custody of Romy, being taken off the Herville case is the last thing she needs. We know she doesn’t do well without work. It could just be for the best when that other renegade fallen on hard times, Joséphine, shows up on her doorstep, looking for a place to stay. Laure could do with the company, and it could be a long night when these two start comparing war stories. Speaking of Joséphine…
Joséphine
He’s tried leaning on the president of the Law Society, witness tampering and a crooked reconstruction, but in the end it’s just a few words whispered by Edelman in Vern’s ear that gain Joséphine’s freedom. We may never know what he said, but it has Vern backpedalling away from his original testimony like it’s radioactive waste. Edelman even offers her a job with him while she waits to get her license back.
It’s enough to make a girl’s heart melt, but all Joséphine can think of is Lola. She insists that Edelman’s firm take on her case, moved by the plight of a woman whose only crimes were blackmail, extortion and driving a young teacher to suicide. The press called Lola and her co-conspirator She Devils and Joséphine absolutely likes the sound of that. A hint of gendered demonisation, a fight against the odds and a still-at-large accomplice to pursue? Ms Karlsson is all about that life.
Roban
They say that hospitals are some of the most dangerous places in the world and we’re seeing plenty of evidence of that this year. We’ve already had Mr Vouters’ untimely death in the operating theatre, and now François suffers a brutal head trauma when he walks into a sliding door, leaving him with a bloodied snozz and some tarnished pride. Still, he manages to score a dinner date with Dr Micaleff while he’s recovering, having exonerated her from sole culpability in Vouters’ death. It ends with a kiss, and the hope that Roban can waltz into retirement with a good woman on his arm.
Thoughts and observations
“No, hang on, you can’t go behind Beckriche’s back.” Ali, showing some touching naivety. Gilou gives him a pep talk about the importance of being a team player and he reluctantly goes along, his objections noted for the record. He truly is the new Tintin.
Law enforcement want to identify an intermediary the network will need between the cash rich and the cash poor – someone who can easily navigate high and low society. Sounds a bit like Edelman?
Pity poor Rayan – his brother murdered, his mother barely acknowledging him and a prison stretch surrounded by predators awaiting him. The kid’s dumb as a box of rocks and isn’t tough enough to make up for it.
There’s the hint of something romantic brewing between Gilou and the fraud squad’s Soizic as she helps him decode the text messages. If he’s looking for a way out from the folie à deux he shares with Laure, this might be it.
How much does Edelman know? Can Laure bounce back? Is Gilou really getting out? Let us know what you’re thinking below …
